Let’s Look at Common Causes of Sciatica

When a condition affects about 40% of the population at some point, it’s a condition that’s  worth understanding a little better, especially what causes it.

In this case, we’re talking about sciatica, which is one of the most common features of low back pain. The first point we want to make about sciatica is that it’s not really a primary condition. It’s a group of symptoms that’s caused by an issue in your lower back that affects  your sciatic nerve.

In this month’s blog post, board-certified pain management specialists Dr. Maziar Massrour and Dr. Naveen Reddy, along with the rest of the team at Apex Pain Specialists, want to review some of the underlying issues that can lead to painful sciatica.

Sciatica: Of all the nerve

In each case of sciatica, no matter its origins, there’s something that’s pinching your sciatic nerve, which is the largest nerve in the human body. It starts in your lower back and splits and travels down each of your legs, all the way to your feet.

Your sciatic nerve is made up of motor and sensory nerve fibers from nerve roots that exit your spine in the lumbar and sacral regions. Collectively, the nerve roots in these areas make up your lumbosacral plexus.

When something pinches your sciatic nerve, or irritates it, you can experience:

• Pain in your lower back
• Pain that shoots down one side of your buttocks and into your leg
• Numbness and tingling
• Weakness in your leg and/or foot

In extreme cases of nerve compression, you can lose bladder control, but this isn’t all that common.

The road to sciatica

Now that we’ve explained what’s behind sciatica, let’s talk about the conditions that lead to problems with this large nerve, such as:

Herniated disc

Far and away, the most common cause of sciatica is a herniated disc. Under normal circumstances, each of your 23 intervertebral discs occupies a space between two vertebrae to provide mobility and cushioning along your spine. 

When a disc bulges or herniates, pieces of it can escape this space and press up against your sciatica nerve, leading to sciatica.

Lumbar spinal stenosis

Another road to sciatica is lumbar spinal stenosis, which describes degenerative changes that narrow your spinal canal. And your sciatica nerve can be affected by this narrowing.

Spondylothesis

This is a degenerative condition in which one vertebrae in your lower back slips out in front of another, which can compress your sciatic nerve.

Arthritis

If you have arthritis in your lower back, bone spurs can develop that press up against your sciatic nerve.

Piriformis syndrome

With this condition, muscles in your buttocks are too tight and it constricts your sciatic nerve.

Finding relief from sciatica

When it comes to solutions, our first goal is to relieve your sciatica pain, which we can do with interventional therapies, such as epidural injections and piriformis injections which both work to block the nerve from signaling pain.

Once we relieve your pain, we can then work toward improving the underlying condition that led to your sciatica in the first place.

So, whatever brought about your painful sciatica, we’re here to help with immediate and longer-term solutions to keep your low back and lower extremity pain at bay.

If you have more questions about sciatica or you’d like to visit with one of our pain management specialists, please call our office in Chandler, Arizona, at 480-820-7246 today to schedule an appointment. You can also book an appointment online.